


I Will Take This Weight To Hell

by buttface



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Anxiety, Drinking, Fire, Kissing, M/M, POV Second Person, Protective Crowley, Things that didn't happen, crowley's questionable grasp of human biology, emotional crash landings, excessive parentheticals, not just a hot mess THE hot mess, rated teen for thirsty demon, the very second night of the rest of their lives, thinking about all the ways they didn't die, thirsty in multiple ways he's spent a lot of time near fire lately
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-29
Updated: 2019-07-29
Packaged: 2020-07-23 22:35:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20015893
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/buttface/pseuds/buttface
Summary: It should make you feel better knowing nobody even tried to murder him. Not that time, anyway. Nobody targeted him while you were too busy showing off. Your last ever words to him weren't you hanging up on him when he was trying to put his faith in you over Heaven for once. It was just an inconvenient accidental discorporation, you found him again, he has a new body, everything is fine. You didn't get him killed.Why don't you feel better?*It's been one dinner at the Ritz since Crowley and Aziraphale returned unscathed from each other's trials and the adrenaline is starting to wear off. Crowley can't let go of the trauma of the bookshop burning, even though he's the only one who remembers it. Nothing a few more glasses of wine in Aziraphale's backroom can't fix, right?





	I Will Take This Weight To Hell

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to ... basically all of tumblr for giving me things to think about for this. God, I love this adaptation. While "the blossom knows" was reasonably book-friendly, this one is definitely about the TV version.
> 
> Title is from "Angel, Please" by Ra Ra Riot because I have done my time in the Queen lyrics mines already.
> 
> FYIs:  
> \- Crowley spends a lot of time thinking about the ways Aziraphale could have died in fire. There's nothing graphic, but that concept is pretty central.  
> \- There's some open-mouthed kissing, but nothing more explicitly sexual than that.

It has been something like twenty-four hours since the world didn’t end and you have not been able to spend nearly enough of them drunk, but you’re doing your best to make up for lost time. You’re frankly grateful to Heaven and Hell for making their move against the two of you quickly; you don’t think you could have stood any more time spent tensed waiting for the other boot to drop on your face. (You congratulate yourself for this mixed metaphor and commit it to memory for later use on Aziraphale, who will hate it.) 

You have had to spend the last few days engaged in some very serious dread and now that the tension of immediate peril is starting to wear off you’re beginning to think about everything that’s happened. There was a lot of everything, not just the things that happened but also the things that only almost happened and the things that you thought happened and the things that happened, but now did not happen. And you really don’t like thinking about it. 

Thus, alcohol.

Aziraphale had agreed that being adjacent to the averting of the Apocalypse was a reasonable excuse for opening the last of the Châteauneuf-du-Pape, which you’ve already drank once eleven years ago so you know it’s good. Or, well, maybe you drank it. You don’t know if it’s the same bottles that were in the backroom a few days ago, or if they were destroyed and restored after one of the events that you’re drinking to forget. You've definitely drank them now at any rate. You’ve moved on to … well, you don’t quite remember what the label on this bottle said before you peeled it off to give your fingers something to do besides dig into your palms, but that just means it’s working. 

It’s nice wine, anyway. You’ve drank quite a lot of wine in your time, you know from nice. Wine’s been around almost as long as you have, which was considerate of it. You think Aziraphale might have had something to do with it. Seems like his sort of thing. (You claimed the credit for hangovers, which Hell has always failed to appreciate the potential of.)

Currently Aziraphale is walking slowly through his stacks, glass of wine in hand, peering at each shelf. You’d warned him about the new books Adam had gifted him and so he’s insisted that he needs to check the entire collection to see if there are any other surprises or omissions, as if he doesn’t know that you have the whole bookshop memorized, too. He’s left the door to the backroom propped open so that you can watch the indignant frown he makes every time he sees something that might not be precisely where he left it.

You made sure you were the first to see the bookshop this morning in case it wasn't restored. You had a hunch it would be; between the residual feeling of Adam's magic everywhere and the fact that the bus hadn't had to plough through a wall of fire to get you home last night it was pretty clear that London in general had been thoroughly repaired. But you couldn't be _sure_. And you didn't want Aziraphale to have to be the one to find out if it wasn't, not without you there to try to soften the blow. You told him it had to be you that went, to keep up the disguise; you have no idea if he was fooled.

Anyway, he checked on the Bentley for you. So you’re even. Just an exchange of favors. Things have hardly changed at all, right? Right.

You wanted things to change for so long, but that’s hardly the same as being prepared for the actuality of it. Really, you hardly wanted much of a change, you just wanted everyone involved to be a little more honest about it. That isn’t too much to ask, is it? You only wanted knowledge. 

(You know too much now. Knowing always has consequences. Aziraphale knows, and now he can never return to Heaven. You are glad and not glad for that. He deserves better than them, but what he got instead is you. You tried to explain this to him but he just told you you were drunk, which was hard to argue with.)

You survived it all, anyway. It hardly seems plausible.

"We aren't dead, you know," you say aloud to see if it sounds any less surprising that way. It doesn't.

Aziraphale takes a few steps back so he can peer at you through the door, over the wine he’s swirling around and around in his glass. “I believe that was the goal.”

Which is not an entirely accurate summary of how the last few days have gone for you, but close enough. Aziraphale not being dead was certainly your goal, which you weren’t always sure you were going to succeed at. But you aren’t thinking about that! You forgot for a moment not to think about that.

(You will probably never again not think about it. The bookshop burned with the sick, burnt-plastic stench that burning homes give off, not the clean woodsmoke scent of a bonfire. You know it well, even if the precise chemical details of what humans have in their homes to burn have changed over the years. It is as if the love and care and life that permeates a home is itself what turns to thick black choking smoke; it turns your stomach every time you smell it, but yesterday was the first time you really _understood_ it. It was _your_ home, _your_ love and care that was choking you this time. Was, is. You may spend more time in your flat but you _live_ here, in this backroom, on this old couch with this wineglass and Aziraphale’s soft eyes on you.)

You must have made a face because Aziraphale is still looking at you skeptically. Perhaps you’re being too quiet, even though you hoped he would accept that you were just trying to let him inspect the bookshop in peace. You’re rarely quiet around him no matter what he’s doing. There are things you don’t talk about, loads of things, but you’ve always felt more comfortable around him than with anyone else. (This admittedly isn’t saying much since “anyone else” for you would be mostly demons, very few of whom are any fun to be around. There’s no Demon of Mid-Afternoon Hypothetical Conversations Down The Pub.) 

Usually you say whatever pops into your head and Aziraphale will go along with it. He probably still would today. You just don’t want him to go along with any of the things that are in your head today. Those are places you don’t want him to ever have to go, not again.

But you don’t want to get up and leave him either. Because, well.

(It's because you love him. It isn’t news. You have carried that feeling with you close to your heart for six thousand years, but you always seem to be finding new sides to it. Today you have found loss and grief tucked away in a secret corner of it and you can't stop poking at it, feeling out its shape.)

You don’t know how humans can bear having all these emotions all the time. You’ve only had to reckon with your own mortality (with Aziraphale’s mortality) for twenty four hours or so and it’s already worn you out; they’ve got to do it their whole lives.

You pour yourself another glass of wine. 

Aziraphale must be reasonably satisfied with the state of his books because he returns to the backroom. He drifts towards his usual well-stuffed easy chair, hesitates, then abruptly changes direction and heads to the other side of the couch whose arm you’re perched unsteadily upon. That’s new. He’s on the wrong side, but that’s your fault; you were on the wrong side first. 

If you let yourself fall from the couch arm towards him, you would stretch across the empty cushion in the middle and land in his lap. You would feel the fond extravagance of his breath against your hair; you could reach for his well-manicured fingers. You know they’re soft, despite the dry pages they touch all day. He likes to let people take care of his hands and his hair for him, even though he doesn’t really have to. You’re a little glad that at least someone is appreciating him, and also jealous.

You have always had to hold a space between yourselves, for safety and propriety. Oh, you’ve thrown yourself against it from time to time, mostly because Aziraphale wouldn’t, but it is practically a third party in your relationship. But now you really don’t need it anymore, do you? The worst has happened. There is nothing left for you to be afraid of, and that in itself is terrifying. Fear is all that’s kept you going for the last few days. 

You should be filling yourself up with hopes and dreams of all the things you and Aziraphale can do now that push has come to shove and in the end he finally, finally chose you. What little you had to offer him. You’re just so tired. You want to offer him joy and all you really have is “well, we aren’t dead, and I don’t quite believe it.”

You can go to the Ritz whenever you like now, you realise. You've only just come from there, but you could go back tomorrow. Aziraphale would probably be thrilled. People could see you together and it would not matter at all! You could dine at the Ritz _every day_. The waitstaff would probably think it was _cute_.

You could finally have that picnic. You don’t entirely know what happens at a picnic, but you can make something up. Sandwiches, probably. That’s easy enough. Put things Aziraphale likes between two slices of bread. 

Watch him smile with delight when he takes a bite of - of oysters in olive oil on rye or whatever. 

Watch his face crinkle, always moving, alive and happy and if not safe, at least _free_ , for better or worse. Free to call out the unfairnesses in the great Plan, free to eat every one of the sandwiches you make him, free to step over the threshold into your flat, joyfully this time, whenever you both like (always, it’s always, you have had a taste of it now and you will never be sated).

You think it's very unfair for the universe to expect you to process both the idea of never seeing Aziraphale again and the idea of possibly seeing him every day in such a short span of time. You've tried to keep your heart in good condition, considering that you barely understand what exactly a heart does, but it wasn't built for these wild swings.

Over six thousand years you have gotten used to things always being more the less the same. Oh, humans change plenty and that gives you something to do, though whether you're guiding them or running to keep up you're never entirely sure. But you've gotten away with shirking the bigger sins and slowly testing the boundaries of acceptable relations with your supposed enemy for so long that you never really thought anything _new_ could happen to you. 

You've never felt so mortal. There's _always_ been the two of you and while there have certainly been moments of sharp suddenness where you thought you could see another way forward in the flickering of Aziraphale's gaze, you always believed you had the advantage of eternity. The lovely thing about eternity is it never becomes now. There’s always more time to put it off. There’s never a last chance.

Of course, you never know it’s the last chance until it’s already past.

(Aziraphale is here now, alive, it’s not the last chance yet. You should reach out to him, you should celebrate his aliveness, your aliveness, the fact that he and you and the books and the Bentley and the Ritz and everyone have a future. It’s not as though you don’t want to. You want to clutch him to you until you’re sure that he won’t crumble to ashes. Until you’re sure that the real Aziraphale is the one here with you and not the one that was lost forever in the fire. But that’s not how it works between the two of you, not even after the end of the world. This thing between you is not fragile, precisely, but it is intricate and finely balanced. You take turns making moves, hoping that the other’s counter-offer will get you where you wanted to be in the first place. You aren’t designed to move fast.)

You strike a compromise and lower yourself down onto the actual cushion of the couch instead of balancing upon its arm. That inches you a little closer to Aziraphale without being presumptuous. It also means you can lean against the back of the couch and rest your head a little, physically if not metaphorically.

Yesterday, this couch with its soft cushions and its familiar slightly musty smell was a pillar of flame. This morning it was back as if nothing ever happened. Now, it holds up your swimming head and cradles your sore back as the alcohol enters your bloodstream and helps you slowly loosen your death grip on -- everything, you suppose. Now that you have run out of gas, it’s catching up to you.

You never really thought there was any chance you'd get caught. Or that the Apocalypse would _really_ happen, even after you’d put the Antichrist in the backseat of your own car. Demons tend not to be very good at consequences; it's a job liability. You're no better than Aziraphale and his faith that nobody would let things get _really_ bad. 

You’ll both have to change now. You have to choose how to act without having authority (whether obeying or avoiding it) as an excuse. The only authority either of you have to answer to anymore is each other, which is _terrifying_. All Hell could do was kill you. 

You didn’t ask for this, for falling in love. You didn’t ask for his spun-sugar hair, his soft eyes, his tartan and fussiness and disdain for your music and natural inclination for trouble and always knowing where to get a nice lunch and being _so_ eager to show it to you, to _you_. You didn’t ask for six thousand years of stories. You didn’t ask for it and every time you see him you are even more devoted to never letting go of it, _especially_ now; you will die before you willingly go through the feeling of losing him again.

He’s staring at you still, hands folded in his lap, resting on his waistcoat. You wish it was your hands resting there, just to be sure that nothing can happen to him without you knowing. What’s your face doing now? God- Someone forbid your face is as open as his is. You hide it behind another swallow of wine.

You're going in circles. Like an angel spiralling downwards.

“The council have been after me about putting in sprinklers,” Aziraphale tells you, finally looking away from your face to frown at the ceiling instead. Adam’s apparently not thought about fire safety any more than the angel has, as the ceilings look exactly as they were before. As far as you can tell, anyway. The ceiling’s never been what you were looking at. “Sprinklers! Can you imagine? In a _bookshop?_ They called this a _deathtrap_.”

“Don’t,” you say immediately.

“What, the sprinklers?” Aziraphale looks scandalized. “I certainly won’t, as if-”

“No. The other word.” You push your sunglasses up your nose, over your eyes. You can’t seem to keep them from slipping down your nose today. Usually you take them off when you’re back here with him, but you wouldn’t much like to look yourself in the eyes right now, much less let anyone else. Much much less one currently very alive and very yours to keep close and protect angel. “Maybe you should take their advice. Look, I know you think you can just miracle any fire away, but obviously you can’t always count on that.”

He’s back to frowning at you. "Is this about the discorporation? I told you, it was only a misstep on my part, embarrassing really…" He doesn’t look upset about it, or even all that embarrassed. Like the fire is only theoretical to him, which you suppose it is. 

He only looks concerned. That’s your doing.

He _had_ told you about the circle and Shadwell and the misstep, last night when you both sat together all night buzzing with anticipation and trying to come to grips with what had happened, or not happened, or not finished happening. You’d even mostly been listening. You’d wanted to, of course, very badly. It was just distracting having him there, in your own home, willingly. That didn’t feel real, not as real as the things that didn’t happen.

You couldn’t tell the origin of the flames when you found the bookshop alight. The background angelic radiation of Aziraphale lingered, mocking the absence of the angel himself, and your own more than occasional presence over the years had contributed no small amount of demonic residue. You couldn’t be sure it wasn’t hellfire, and it would have made sense; you also couldn’t be sure it wasn’t Heaven punishing him by taking away his Earthly ties. Even ordinary fire would have caused him pain before his soul was sent back to its eternal punishment (or to eternal service in the army of Heaven, which might be worse). 

It should make you feel better knowing nobody even tried to murder him. Not that time, anyway. Nobody targeted him while you were too busy showing off. Your last ever words to him weren't you hanging up on him when he was trying to put his faith in you over Heaven for once. It was just an inconvenient accidental discorporation, you found him again, he has a new body, everything is fine. You didn't get him killed.

Why don't you feel better?

Even ordinary fire can hurt a demon’s corporation, if they let it. Hastur gave an excellent demonstration of that. But you have had no time to be vulnerable to anything over the last few days; it never occurred to you that you might be hurt physically by the flames, that was hardly the part you were worried about, and so you weren’t. Even if you had, you suppose Adam would probably have fixed that, too. Nobody else remembers it happening, because it didn't. There are no traces left of the inferno anywhere except in your lungs and your memory. Why can’t you just let it disappear?

You can’t tell him that you can’t stop thinking about it, anyway. He’ll probably just tell you to buck up, that he’s fine, better than fine, now he doesn’t have to file any more memos to head office! It’d be a silly thing to tell _you_ that it’s fine; you have rather a lot of knowledge about how it feels to suddenly be persona non grata in Heaven, even if you didn’t actually like being there. But one of you has to try to look on the bright side sometimes.

You lost Aziraphale and found him again, and you lost Heaven years ago and came to find it was no real loss at all, but you still can't ever be again what you were before. You will make something new, both of you, together this time, and maybe it will be better than either of you could have imagined before. (You hope so. You know you can be better to Aziraphale than Heaven ever was, if he lets you.) But there will always be a part of you that mourns the hopes you had then, the not-knowing. Aziraphale not knowing that you cannot go on without him. You not knowing that either.

You will always choose the knowing in the end, this is who you have always been, but there was a reason the tree came with a warning.

You can see Aziraphale searching for a change of subject. He's getting worried about you, you know. You kind of like it. You would tell him not to worry, you’re fine, but you’re an awful liar for a demon. "What were you up to when I found you after that, anyway? I couldn’t get the hang of seeing without a body, I’m afraid."

"Oh, I was in the pub with a nice bottle of Talisker."

" _Talisker_?"

"Well, I needed _someone_ to talk to while awaiting the end of the world, didn't I? And my best friend was dead," you say rather more sourly than was entirely called for. You really can't just let him lighten the mood, can you? No wonder he never wanted to be seen with you. Who wants to be cast out of heaven for a demon who isn't even any fun?

He looks taken aback. “I thought you were battling the forces of hell to avert the apocalypse.”

You laugh. It isn’t very funny. “Oh, no. I battled one force of hell, briefly, to avert him killing me. But then I got to the fire and, well. Didn’t seem to be much point anymore. I just didn’t want the world to end while I was sober.”

“But the world--” and how can he not _get it_ , after all this.

"Angel," you say with warning in your voice, because you don't want to upset him but you will tell him if he asks. If he wants the responsibility of the knowledge.

He turns his body to face you, shucks off his shoes so he can tuck his feet up on the couch. A little more space carved out from between you. " _Please_ , Crowley."

“What _use_ ,” you say very slowly, “is a world that doesn’t have you in it?” There it is. You try to look him in the eye when you say it, because it’s one of those rare occasions when he’s too shocked to do the thing he does where he only furtively glances at you and you want to take advantage of it, and it’s only afterwards you realize that the effect is probably spoiled by your sunglasses still being firmly in place. So you take another swig of the wine to punctuate instead.

You’ve seen a lot of expressions on him in six thousand years, but this one is new. Probably he’s disappointed in you. After all this time, haven’t you developed any love for the planet you make your home in, Crowley? Well, yes, of course you have, but it’s all tied up with Aziraphale. You could have nobly tried to save it in his memory, but you’d still hate it every time you passed a sushi restaurant that he would never eat at again. You wouldn’t have made any difference in whether it was saved or not regardless, but you could have _tried_ and you had pointedly decided not to. Not until he found you and asked you, because even if you were going to die at least that way you'd be near him again.

You would never have been able to forgive a world that kept existing when he didn't. You never learned that heavenly patience and self-sacrifice; you didn’t get to that part of the curriculum before they tossed you out.

You aren’t doing a very good job of not talking about this. You wish you’d kept the Talisker, you could tell it all about how you feel without hurting anyone. 

It’s just that you need him to understand, is all. You need him to understand how important he is. You don’t know how to explain all the things you’re feeling right now if you even wanted to, but you need him to know that much. He needs to know that you aren't sorry, that you would do it all again (the fall, the fear) if it meant you could be with him at the end.

“Crowley,” he starts, and you watch his face move but he still doesn’t look away from you. Is he summoning all his bravery for your sake, or does he not understand how important this is for you? You don’t know. There’s still so much you don’t know.

You imagine what he might be thinking. _What can I ask him? What is it all right to say now?_ Or maybe those are your questions for yourself. 

You want to ask him:

_Do you know how it feels to love someone and watch them choose again and again to put their faith in something that does not deserve them? To know that it is probably for the best, for all that it makes you sick to see them corrupt themselves like that, because you aren’t enough to keep them safe?_

_Do you know how it feels when the presence that you have felt at the edge of your mind and the center of your heart for six thousand years, for so long that you have never felt the earth without it (yet it never fades into the background; you could follow it unerringly, indeed, you spend much of your time finding reasons not to), when that presence is suddenly gone?_

_Do you know how it feels to taste ash on your tongue and wonder if it is the last earthly remnant of his flesh?_ (You have yearned for centuries to taste him, you serpent, now reap what you have sown.) 

_Do you know how it feels to know that you could have saved him if you hadn’t been so precious about always letting him have a choice? If you had been faster or cleverer, he would be safe in the stars with you; even if he hated you for all eternity, he would be_ safe _._

_I hope you never know._

But you don’t want to hear any of that, even coming out of your own mouth. You aren’t mad at him; you absolutely, emphatically aren’t mad at him. You’re just mad.

(Some terrible smart aleck part of you - which is basically all of you of course, that's how you got here - points out that he did have to watch you be dragged off to your possible death this morning, so it’s not as if he’s gotten off lightly. That part of you is no fun sometimes. 

They couldn't get to him without getting through you first. Not without you being able to warn him. Even if you didn't put up much of a fight, even if you had to let it happen for the sake of the plan, you're still proud of that.)

“I’m just tired, angel,” you tell him. Hardly seems the time to start trying to lie to him. (Sort of lying. It’s true apart from the “just”.) Judging by his face, you aren’t any good at it, either. 

You watch his gaze flicker to his knees, where his hands fidget uncomfortably. Maybe you should get him a wine bottle to peel the label off. “Crowley,” he starts again. “Did something happen in Heaven? Don’t think I didn’t notice you changing the subject away from it at dinner.”

Ah yes, the other thing you aren’t thinking about. Because the bookshop wasn’t the only place you thought you might have lost him, was it? You risked him twice more today, the death he would have faced in Heaven and the death he faced for you in Hell. What’s more, you did it on _purpose_ , because you thought you were _clever_. 

Even if you know now that nobody was trying to kill Aziraphale in the bookshop, it doesn’t change the fact that Gabriel wanted him dead forever, wiped from existence like a bug at the bottom of his scuffless shoe. The way he looked at you, at _him_ , at _your angel_. You were only wrong about _when_ death would come looking.

You don’t really mind that Hell wants to kill _you_ ; you’ve been expecting that for hundreds of years, you both know that. You now even sort of have it coming, considering Ligur. There’s nothing there that you’ll miss, anyway. There’s only one thing you’d really miss if it were gone, and it’s here on Earth with you now. Anything else you can work around, even the Bentley.

How would Aziraphale have faced the hellfire? How would he have felt, really, walking towards the premature end of his eternity? You must never, ever let him have to find out. 

You have shown Heaven the best of him, you have let them see what you love most and what they do not deserve to have. Do not think about the fear he might have felt if he was really going to his death. That is too much courage to ask of anyone, even him.

(Do not think of how fast his silver curls would catch flame, the lingering stench of burnt feathers, all the colors of his tartan fading quickly to the same dark, crumbling ash. Do not think of his soft, expressive mouth warping into a scream. Do not think of all the things you would never be able to tell him. You will _keep him safe_. You have gotten a second chance and you will _not. fail. him. again_.)

He has not been afraid yet, not truly. Afraid for you, maybe. But despite everything, you suspect he still has too much faith to have expected what he would have gotten. Not the contempt in Gabriel’s voice, not the disinterest in justice, not the sheer delight in meting out punishment. Even Hell had the good grace to be _bored_. 

You love this about him, despite yourself. He has unshakable faith that everything will basically be all right. It terrifies you, because it _isn’t_ going to be all right, not without a lot of work. But without it you would be cold and alone somewhere orbiting Alpha Centauri. 

You don’t know if you would be strong enough to bear the faith he does. You are good at questioning and doubting and undermining and lashing out, but you don’t know how to trust that others will do the right thing, that everything will work out, even if it needs a little guidance. You don’t know how to choose to fight rather than run away. You are a snake scuttling under a rock.

(You are learning. He is teaching you. You are more like him than you were yesterday. You have worn his skin and gone through the motions of being him and you think perhaps now you get it, a little bit.)

He’s saying something to you. You weren’t listening, you were thinking about the fires. Stop that. You need to stay here with him, anchor yourself, stop floating away on what almost was (as if you have ever learned to stay where you’re put). Get your act together. What if they come back? What if death decides fourth time's the charm? He needs you. Or you need him to need you, which is almost the same thing, isn't it?

He’s here, now, it’s not safe, how do you keep him _safe_?

“You don’t want to hear about the trial, angel,” you try. “Tell me again about the rubber duck.”

“There wasn’t a rubber duck.”

“I know, I know. But I like the way you tell it.” That’s not a lie. You love his laugh, the fullness of it. You could bury yourself in it, take roots in his joy and grow strong.

“Crowley, please, I need you to tell me what they did to you, my s-”

You hear Aziraphale almost say “my side” and hesitate and you ache for him. Of course it’s still hard for him. You’ve had six thousand years to get used to exile and he’s had a few hours. But you also saw Gabriel tell him to die already and smile, and you are furious on his behalf because you don’t think he’ll be furious enough.

“Hey, angel, it’s okay. It’s not important.”

“Not _important?_ ” Oh, no, no no no. He’s upset now, you’ve ruined it. You don’t know if he’s ever really felt the pure righteousness of fury; what he has is this, anger turned to hurt, like at the gazebo. You’re always putting your foot wrong like this, trying to guide him to your way of thinking and pushing him too fast. “How could it not be _important_? We’re our own side now, aren’t we? We can’t afford to keep secrets from each other.”

Oh yes, he knows your weak spots. You’d better learn to keep him on your side. He’d make a formidable enemy if he ever wanted. 

“Angel, you don’t want--” you begin, but he immediately leans forward to cut you off.

“ _Don’t tell me what I don’t want!_ ” O, the holy glow in his eyes! You don’t know if his fury is truly celestial, your senses are all jumbled these days, you can’t tell the difference anymore. He is more fearful to you than all of heaven. He is still sitting on the couch, physically, but his presence looms above you. Though it always has. He doesn’t even need to get his wings out. “I’m _tired_ of being told what I don’t want.”

You never learned how to face his anger. The last time he was mad at you, you slept for nearly a century, until you had an opportunity to recast yourself as his hero. You go to take another swallow of wine, but he leans forward and grabs your wrist.

“After all this time, don’t make me fight you now,” he murmurs, and you can see why it was him God gave the flaming sword to.

\-- and you see why also when he lets go of you immediately, as if startled by himself. “I’m sorry, my dear, I just--”

“No, you’re right.” You put the wineglass down - it’s more or less empty anyway by now - and shake out your wrist to show him he hasn’t done any harm. 

He _is_ right. If you love him, if you care about him so much more than Heaven does, you owe him the trust and honesty they never gave him. You do trust him, of course. You just have a lot of fear and worry for him too, and you've forgotten how to find anything else under it. 

“I knew I had nothing to worry about as soon as they got out the holy water but I didn’t know what they might do to you, even though I know you chose this plan as much as I did, and when you came back you looked so _angry_ , and I wanted to cheer you up but I couldn’t bear not knowing what happened to you--” He babbles, his hand still hanging in midair from where he let go of you, and you like to imagine he’s saying _reassure me, please, this is what you do for me_.

You never really considered the possibility he might be feeling the same hurt, did you? You should give him more credit. (It’s hard, when giving him credit means taking some for yourself, too.) Imagine him, safe and proven holy but with no idea what had happened to you. What if Heaven had found you out? What if Heaven had decided that Aziraphale might have Fallen and that the only way to test him would be with holy water? 

How long would he have to wait for you before realizing you would never come back to him?

It’s not easy, this thing between you. It’s never been easy, but being ostensibly on opposite sides of an ancient holy war used to be a pretty good excuse. Now it is just hard in the way that love has been hard for every lover in the last six thousand years.

“Hey.” You reach out to gently take his hand. You may not know what to do with your own fear and frustration, but you know what to do when you see his. For him you have learned to be gentle and patient and brave; perhaps you can also learn to share. “I’m all right. They couldn’t hurt me.”

He doesn’t move away, so you rub your thumb softly along the side of his hand. “I know. I _know_.” _I’m here, you’re here. I know that you’re thinking about what if I wasn’t, I know that getting through by the skin of your teeth doesn’t make you stop thinking about what might have been_.

You feel tender for him; like a lover, but also like a bruise.

(You love him so much that your skin burns. You love him so much that the word would shatter your tongue if you ever tried to speak it. You love him and it is unspeakable, ineffable. You love him, you want to wrap yourself around him like a shield, you want to destroy everything that makes him unhappy; you know that both of these desires are more about you than about him. He does not need you to save him, he needs you to stand by him as an equal, and you are not sure that you can.)

“Just please. Don’t keep me in the dark. Even if it might be easier for me in the short term. I’ve spent enough time being stupid.” He smiles at you, to soften the memory of what you said to him. (You hope he understands it now; Heaven does not deserve his forcing himself not to think.) “I’ll hear you now, so please tell me. Tell me my verdict.”

Verdict, because he thinks there was a trial. You got a trial, after all. Hell always did like to style themselves fairer than heaven; it doesn’t take much to clear that bar.

You do not let go of his hand. “There wasn’t a trial, angel.”

He stills, blinks twice. You find yourself holding your breath as you watch him compose himself. “Ah. I suppose I should have anticipated that. Heaven never was much in favor of mercy.” He pauses to think. There’s no rush. You could watch the movement of his face for years. Maybe you will. “Gabriel jumped straight to execution then, did he? I can’t _believe_ I used to tell people he was such a considerate boss. He never could take suggestions.”

You watch him smile to himself and you can’t believe it. Of course you _believe_ it, you believe everything he says to you, but even though you half expected it, it still doesn’t feel fair. “Aren’t you mad?”

“I’m not sure heaven is worth my anger. I’ve given them enough of myself already.” He runs his thumb over your hand, and you almost successfully suppress a shiver. 

“I wanted to destroy Gabriel then and there,” you confess. “I don’t know if they could have stopped me, if I’d been willing to break character.”

“I’m glad you didn’t. I’m glad you came back to me instead.”

“Yeah, well.” You scratch at your ear as an excuse to take your hand back, because you’re not sure what to do if he keeps holding it and _looking_ at you like that. “He’d better watch his step next time.”

“I don’t think I’m ready to want to hurt them, you know,” Aziraphale says conversationally, as if you were simply discussing the weather. “I don’t know if I _should_. What I really wanted was to _humiliate_ them, Heaven and Hell both.” 

His eyes gleam, as if he’s telling you about the first edition he’s beaten a competitor to and not about your respective near-demises. (You love him, you love him.) “Because how dare they? How _dare_ they. How dare they make me believe I couldn’t know right from wrong on my own. How dare they make you live in fear. How dare they try to stand between us, when there’s no difference between them.”

(When he came back to the garden this afternoon, you thought _Thank God he's safe_ , without hesitation for once, because if She planned Armageddon that way, then she must have planned for this too, for the ache in your hearts, for choosing love over duty. You may never know for sure, but you can believe it, if you like. You do. You hope someday he does, too.)

He laughs. You want to bask in it like sunlight. “Thank you, Crowley.”

“For what?”

“For six thousand years. I know I haven’t made it easy for you.”

“Easiest thing I ever did, angel.” 

“You don’t have to keep calling me that, you know.” 

“I like it. You don’t like it?”

“I’ve just never been sure what you mean by it.”

You don’t know what to say to that. Because you mean _him_ , he’s the only angel that matters, and it has sometimes meant that you’re angry that he’s an angel and you’re not, and sometimes it has meant that you hope that he watches over you, and sometimes that you want him above you, and sometimes it just means a horrible tooth-rotting sugary confection of a thing. You don’t know another way to say all that at once.

You know what you want to think he’s trying to ask you, now that he’s free to. You know you don’t need to be so reluctant to meet him where he’s going. You would have given him anything, always, you would have run to the stars with him no matter what happened to the world if he wanted (though perhaps he would be a different angel to the one you love if he didn't want the things of Earth), but after six thousand years of feeling like a second choice to Heaven, you don't know how to accept what he’s offering.

(You think that, perhaps, you never were second choice; perhaps he, too, was just trying to keep you safe.)

“We could have that picnic sometime, if you like,” you offer, feeling like you’ve still not quite got this right. You don’t know what’s too fast now. If you stick to things he’s offered before, you won’t scare him away, you won’t lose him. “Or go back to the Ritz again.”

“We can’t just act as though the last few days didn’t happen and everything is the same as always, Crowley. I rather thought you’d be happy about that.” There it is, the turn of his head away from you and the shy flicker of his eyes back to meet yours, just for a second. Is it shy or is it coy? You’ve never been sure if he knows that you know.

“Only, now that there’s nobody looking over our shoulders anymore, I was rather hoping--”

His hands are fidgeting on his knees again. If you reach for them, if you touch him now, you will never be able to let him go. You will feel the life under his skin - the entirely decorative heartbeat, yes, but the stubbornness and generosity and glory below that too - and you will never be able to bear wondering if he’s safe when he is away from you. You have always been able to tell yourself that you have all the time in the world, that maybe next time you’ll tell him.

The worst has happened and you’ve both survived it. There’s no danger you can put him in now that he isn’t already in. You want so badly to protect him, but you also want so badly for him to choose you. Can you accept it now, at last, now that it might come true? Because he isn’t stupid, you know this. He knows what he’s saying. 

He plucks the sunglasses from your face, gently; you think he folds them before putting them on the side table but you really don’t care, not when he’s _looking_ at you like that, your armor down. Not that you’ve ever really had any around him, not successfully. You’ve never really wanted to. Anything of you that he wants is his.

You still -- you love him and you’re glad that he knows that, you think, though also how _embarrassing_ that this whole time you thought you were being subtle, but you don’t want to put your foot wrong again (feet, you’ve never got the hang of feet, you think frantically) --

He reaches for you, grazes a thumb over your cheekbone on the way to taking the right angle of your jaw firmly in hand, and pulls you toppling forward to kiss him.

When he lets go, you chase his lips with yours for as long as you can before you tumble into his lap at last. He’s warm and soft and his fingers tangle in your hair and you don’t know if you’d rather stay here basking in his warmth or kiss him again. You wish you could do both. You didn’t get it quite right, you want another chance, you can learn. Give me another chance, angel.

You breathe him in greedily, the scent of his cologne and his books and the laundry detergent he uses even though he doesn’t have to because while he’ll happily miracle himself up an entire new outfit, he won’t miracle out the dirt because he says he’ll still _remember_ it. There is no smell of smoke on him but _you_ still remember it even if it never happened now. Everything he loved, everything that was him on this earth, crackling embers falling around you. Breathe it in now, while you still can, keep him safe inside of you. 

You work your way up his chest, inhaling him. When your lungs are full, you kiss his neck where the skin shows, the burst of air from his soft gasp ruffling your hair. You don’t have words, but you can try to show him. You spread your hands over him, covering him, moving fire-quick.

There is no taste of char on his lips, but they’re so dry. It’s dangerous for them to be so dry. What if there’s a spark? You feel as though you can hear yourself crackling. You will have to tease open his lips to reach his safe, wet mouth. You have always wondered if it would burn you like holy water; you are a little disappointed that it does not. You might like to bear his scars on your flesh.

He pulls back and frowns and your heart drops for a moment. “You’re drunk, dear boy,” he says, chewing his soft lip in concern, but the thing is you aren’t. You wanted to be; you should be; if you were human, you’d be having quite a hard time standing upright. But you never really bothered to figure out how alcohol is supposed to be broken down in the body, so it works the same way everything else around you does, which is however you feel like it should. You drank to try to quench the fire inside you, but the fire burned it all up, no matter how much you gave it. 

“I’m not,” you confess. “Are you?” Because you know that bottle should be emptier.

He shakes his head. “Barely had a sip. Suppose my heart wasn’t in it.”

“Oh? What is your heart in then?” you say, wishing you felt half as cool as you try to convince people you are.

“Don’t be silly, my dear,” he says, and kisses you, and this time it is him finding his way into your too-eager mouth.

 _Is this safe?_ you think. _Are we safe? Will we ever be safe?_ _Can I say goodbye to you ever again without wondering if it’s the last time? I think we did the right thing, I think we are safer than we were, but now I know how close we have always been to ruin and the closer I hold you the harder it is to let you go, even knowing we’ll always find each other again._

“Stay with me, angel,” you beg him, blurting it out against his now damp lips. “Stay with me until--” you have to ask for something reasonable, not _until the stars fall_ , not _for as long as we both shall live_ , though even then you’d think of something. It isn’t fair to make him responsible for your happiness, even though it’s far too late to change that. 

“Yes,” he says, without waiting for you to qualify your offer, “yes, I would like that.”

**Author's Note:**

> whether or not they hooked up after this is up to you and I respect your choices but if you choose yes I may have a sequel for you later on
> 
> shout out to [my Good Omens playlist](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0Qcr5kd6Ah18FivgGPbkTx?si=gu6URhQFSq-9ZqYigcALyw) for moral support
> 
> disclaimer: crowley is an unreliable internal narrator. I doubt he could actually take the archangels in a fight but he doesn't need to accept that, and of course he already knew how to be gentle and brave (maybe not patient) but if he wants to credit his virtues to time spent with aziraphale I think we can cut him that slack.


End file.
